We're ramping up for the Greatest Show on Earth. Not Cirque du Soleil. I'll get to that in a second. I'm tawking 'bout news I dropped last week: Joey Lekkas—Surreal Sound co-owner, M Room guy—taking the Heyday booking slot from Live Nation D.C.-bound Stacie George. What it means is he'll be taking the reigns at North Star and Khyber (What? Not Rex's?!). Which also means, with Live Nation/Heyday guy Jon Hampton also leaving town, there's lots of tossing and turning in the Heyday/Live Nation/Electric Factory world. Lekkas though? He's suave. Plays it close to his vest (it looked like a vest!) when talking about booking it George-stylee. "I'm still trying to learn. I guess I'll get bigger bands, more variety, you know," says Lekkas, comparing Khyber to M Room, a space he'll still oversee but keep separate from Heyday. His Surreal partner Maiken Scott will do the majority of M Room booking—some bands, mostly DJ/dance stuff, mostly leftovers from Silk City, leaving Joe pretty much running the city. Joe: Prepare to blow plenty o' loads. Everybody's gwana be sucking your dick. (He laughed when I warned him!) As for Cirque's stuck-in-Souf-Philly Quidam, le Grand Chapiteau erects next week for July 6's start. But CirDuSo bosses are already here. Like Cirquer Marie-Helene Gagnon who left running Soleil show Saltimbanco to be Quidam's artistic director. With Cirque coming to Philly for years, why'd it take so long for the decade-old Quidam show to hit us? Maybe a save-the-best-for-last thing. "We had to be ready for you," says Gagnon of bringing a 150-plus-person village of French people "having fights, having fun" to my corner at Broad and Washington. Funny, since Quidam is the fluidest, quietest, hyper-realest show in the Cirque family. "It's like a crowd picked up at a Metro station speaking a new language I understand, rather than Cirque's usual imaginary planet." If she wants planets speaking weird languages, Gagnon should head toward Geno's a few blocks away. "My favorite Philadelphia thing is the crazy frankness of your people." Hmm, maybe she has been to Geno's.

Mutlu get signed to Manhattan Records? Yes. Is his iTunes-only EP produced by Amos Lee ravaging the interweb? You bet.

Sax manLou Fuiano—a back-in-the day ska-cat from Public Service!—is playing in 10-piece Hoppin' John at Chris' Jazz Cafe June 26 and sending his new Dr. Ketchup CD, Red Light District, into the world June 23 at Fergie's. While Ketchup backs up Phil Roy for the latter's June 24 Summer Solstice appearance at the Kimmel, another of its participants, King Britt, is secretly working on a DJ Spooky collaboration (they share a manager) for 2006's Live Arts/Fringe.

Talking about Love Arts/Fringe, it's CP-award-winning once-monthly show-workshopping, artist-networking jawns at Bar Noir start June 26. Not only can you meet new bosses Heidi and Janera, you can meet each other. Man in Black Dave Stone, Needles Jones, Industrial Improv, Monica McIntrye and Nicki Jaine (the cabaret doyenne who's also doing an obvious gig at Raven Lounge June 22 before leaving town) perform. And Uncut Productions, sweating their asses off out back of the Art Museum's smelly Waterworks area filming their reality-battling Eye of the Tiger, joins the June 26 Fringe party too, stopping production long enough to show footage.

Duets? So incestuous is Vetiver/Espers-er Otto Hauser playing all over The Black Swan, ages-old Brit-freak-folk avatar Bert Jansch's due-for-autumn CD. This is akin to sucking off your dad. Speaking of such, Philly's John Legend appears with Bono, Babs (whose tour starts in Philly Oct. 4, and Christ, I got so many notes from my gay friends in high school asking for tix) and Tim McGraw with Tony Bennett on his September CD, Tony Bennett: Duets/An American Classic. Between Espers and Legend, the Legend thing seems weirder, dunnit?

Faith Hill, and their kids were spotted leaving Sofitel and supping at Gioia Mia, his band and road crew were whooping it up last Thursday at Raven Lounge. Happyhappy: ?uestlove and Jazzy Jeff's Squarebiz anniversary bash at Fluid found Bahamadia and Boyz II Men in on reindeer games. To say nothing of Melle Mel doing "White Lines." Rapping 'em, not snorting 'em. Sadsad: Derek Jeter hung out at the bar at the Walnut Room, grooving to Joey Blanco, after the Yanks got their azzes kicked Monday night. Undergirl's Amy DiCamillo reports that she hiked it to the Sony Building in Manhattan to try out as bassist for Beyonce's summer tour backing band, just for laughs. "I haven't tried out for anything since high school cheerleading so it was rough," laughs DiCamillo. "It wasn't like I was auditioning for The Stooges." But Beyonce was cute, we hear, tan sweats, no makeup, hair in ponytail. Supa.

Philly's lostest punk icons — the dark-wave, dub-electronic Kraut-rocking Bunnydrums—are making their return. As vital as Sonic Youth had been to the immediate post-punk milieu, Bunnydrums' Frank Marr and Dave Goerk's grueling guttural industrio-sound was akin to stuffing Killing Joke up Suicide's ass and shitting out pieces of Can, Wire and Nine Inch Nails. But better. And prettier. In their time, they released vinyl on punk-radio god Lee Paris' Meta Meta label and Richard Jordan's Red Records, made paranoid classics like Holy Moly (which they're set to re-release) and quit by '80s end, only to re-configure now for a new CD with new members Marc Laurick (Sensory Fix) and Mike Mongiello (Scareho). Grr.

(a_amorosi@citypaper.net)